Re: Meaning of "Klezmer"

[Matt Jaffey <mjaffey2...>]

Lori Lippitz wrote (borrowing from another older thread):
>There are basically three types of klezmer music... 

Aside from questions about the choice of categories themselves and the
specific labels applied to each, it is interesting to me that someone as
knowledgeable as you Lori would choose some of the examples that you did.

>1) Preservationist/European (e.g., Brave Old World, Perlman)

As far as I'm aware, there are very few groups trying to *preserve* the old
European sound (as in the Historically Informed/Early Music sense). I would
include groups like Joshua Horowitz's Budowitz and Di Naye Kapelye.

BOW -

The members of BOW *can* be distiguished from many of the Klezmer groups
performing today in that they have each studied the old style to the extent
that they could perform in a historically informed "preservationist"
(Hankus's "heritage") style if they wanted to. But they definitely and
knowingly introduce contemporary elements into their music. And, as Alan
mentioned, their own term for what they do is "New Jewish Music".

Alan also stated that BOW has adjusted its style to suit the requirements of
the concert stage. While I'm sure that all groups that play concerts do that
to one extent or another, BOW has, in my opinion, done it in a way that
makes its music not so suitable for the traditional simcha setting. In this
sense as well, I don't think BOW is particularly "preservationist".

Perlman -

Perlman made it clear in the "Fiddler" documentary that one of his
intentions was to help preserve or bring back some of our lost heritage. But
I wouldn't include his recordings in the "Preservationist" category. For one
thing, the Klezmatics were one of the groups that he played with. Another is
that his own playing was hardly traditional. I think a few years ago on this
list, Reyzl referred to it as "klezish", because he hadn't taken the time to
be fully informed in the performance style of klezmer violin.

Categories -

I think the most interesting things to come out of the discussions on
categories and labels are:

1) The amount of disagreement.

2) The recognition that there are several purposes for categorizing, and
depending on which of these you pursue, the outcome will be different.
Examples: consumer or seller of cd's, consumer or promoter of concerts, home
collector (maybe the only place where the suggestion of alphabetical sorting
could possibly make any sense), librarian, musicologist.

Matt

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